


the fountain of truth holds remnants of lies

by k2_b0



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Alternate Universe - Virtual Reality, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Memory Loss, Mental Health Issues, One-Sided Attraction, also i have a Chi Siblings au so im sry but chihiro & chiaki are oumas older siblings, kind of stream of consciousness but it's also really not, ouma is... having a bad time but he doesn't even know it, that fact isnt too important but theres this 1 part in here that makes that relevant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-29
Updated: 2018-10-29
Packaged: 2019-08-09 03:17:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16441976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/k2_b0/pseuds/k2_b0
Summary: The him that he is and isn't calls him a liar. He believes it.





	the fountain of truth holds remnants of lies

Two truths and a lie.

Ouma hates that game. To him, that's a truth. Or is it a lie? He isn't really sure, honestly. Because, even if he says that something's true, it could always be a lie. But if he says it's a lie, would people believe him? Or do those around him know him well enough to understand that he can twist things around so much that they become true? And even in that case, would his truths become lies over time, making them false from the very beginning?

It's all very complicated. It's why he loves that game.

Or did he hate it? He cant really remember anymore. Oh, well. Being a liar comes with that sort of thing. Although he doesn't want to be a liar, it seems to be all he is now. His personality is warped, and even if he isn't sure what he is he knows that lies are his truth, and that he needs to cling onto any truth he can now. Celestia says so, so he believes her.

But that's not a very him thing to do, is it? Or was it? Will it be? A pain spikes through his head and Ouma winces. Right. Celestia also said not to think too hard, because the simulation scrambles your brain and turns it all to soup. Alphabet soup, where the letters might spell something sometimes, but most of the time they're all jumbled. Then the soup goes cold, and you have to pour it all down the drain. Glop, glop, glop. That's his brain. All his thoughts hitting the kitchen sink and swirling away. An A, a B, a C! All of them going one by one.

Ah, what was he thinking again?

Right! Celestia told him not to think. Ouma trusts her. Or he thinks he does. Well, he doesn't think he does because thinking hurts his head, but he decides to trust her because she says she's been through the same thing as him. He isn't sure what that is right now, but if she says so he'll believe it!

No, wait, he won't! Trusting people is dangerous!

Why? Why is trusting people dangerous again? He's always trusted people and nothing's gone wrong. They take his money and hit him, but not because of any bad reason! It's because they're friends! Friends give things to their friends, and to be friends you have to trust them!

But do friends call you names and put glass in your food? For some reason he doesn't think so, but the other him says they do so he isn't really sure. The other him is the same him he is now, but he's separate at the same time. Both of them are him, and both of them think different things, but that's okay. Sometimes they agree, like when he says that liars make him cry. Maybe both hims are crybabies. Crybaby is a familiar word, because it's what Chiaki calls him when she visits. Right now he cant remember who she is either, but she must be a crybaby too because each time she sees him her eyes start to water.

Ouma drops his lunch tray, and a doctor runs over and picks it up for him. Then they take him by the elbow and lead him off to the hallway. He thinks there are people staring at him, but his mind-soup has gone cold again, so it's all been poured back down the drain.

The next day, his soup is reheated. Kirigiri-san says that he needs to take a break. A break seems nice, even though he hasn't done much lately. The only thing he's done is eat and sleep. He tells her so, and she looks at him with something in her eyes that looks familiar.

Familiar? He hasn't found something familiar in a while. Except for the word crybaby. Because it's what Chiaki calls him when she--

Has he thought this before?

Thought. Think. That's right! Celestia doesn't want him to think! So he doesn't, and he moves over in his bed until his feet dangle from the edge. His toes scrape the floor, covered with socks, and he puts the soles down one at a time. One at a time makes things easier, because too many things at once make him nervous. And nervous means cold soup, which means bad news. He doesn't like bad news.

His knees shake when he stands, and he holds onto the walker next to his bed. Someone must have put it there, but he isn't sure who. Maybe he did? But that doesn't make sense. It doesn't really matter anyways, he guesses.

The thing has wheels, which is neat. It rolls to the door, dragging him along and it tells him to go out into the hall. He listens, and finds that it's completely empty.

There's sunlight coming through the windows, that means that it's daytime, so the hallway shouldn't be empty. But it is, and so is he. He's empty just like the hallway, just like the soup can and just like Iruma-chan's eyes after she was killed.

Who's Iruma-chan?

Ouma doesn't know, because his empty head is filling with thoughts and it hurts, hurts, hurts! The walker rolls away, tired of him, and his weak knees give out before he can call for it to come back. The sound of him hitting the floor is similar to the time he'd fallen and gotten a concussion, but he's never gotten a concussion by falling so he doesn't know what that means either. He's so tired of not knowing, because everyone else knows but all he knows is that lies are true and that the truth is a lie.

The air that's supposed to be coming to his lungs isn't for some reason, but he doesn't care. Instead he reaches for his walker, but his walker doesn't like him anymore so it left and won't come back. Water rolls down his face, just like water sits in a tank and drowns his friends.

Water holds fish, just like ropes hold girls and his head holds lies.

Standing still isn't happening, and his hands hit the floor because his arms are too weak to keep them up. Maybe he'll die here, just like he'd died before. Togami-san said he died by getting crushed, but getting crushed seems like a weird way to die. Then again, he still has nightmares of girls with torn necks and boys with sticky pink blood.

Blood isn't pink, silly. He would know, he's bleeding right now! From his arms, where his stitches have popped open. He isn't sure where the stitches came from, but they're open and they're bleeding through his bandages, red. Red is a pretty color. Red is a scary color. It reminds him of a girl who held him by the throat in a dream within a dream.

Air still isn't in his lungs, but now there's a shadow in front of him that wasn't there before. His bleeding eyes stare up and see a blank slate.

No? No? Not a blank slate? A face! That's a face, and Ouma recognizes it. It's the boy who's at the End. One, one, one. Not two or three, he's one ending and the Ouma who he is and isn't tells him that he loves him. Then he says he doesn't, and more blood comes from his eyes, joining the carcasses of little bugs scattered across the hospital floor.

The End bends his knees, and crouches eye level with him, mouth moving. No words are coming into Ouma's ears, though, so he choses to believe that the mouth is moving but the vocal cords aren't. Vocal cords make screams, and screams are scary.

Screams. He's screaming.

His ears pop and a sound finally fills them, but it's not a good one, like Naegi-san's CD's or Mioda-san's happy voice. It's a lot of hurt and a lot of breaking, something that he doesn't like. It reminds him of saws, or of broken bones. Like broken bones from a girl falling down-down-down after getting cut by saws as she climbed up-up-up.

The End's vocal cords actually are working, he realizes, because he's saying nice words to him. Words like "calm down" and "you're safe". Ouma thinks those are good words. He likes being calm and safe. Those things make him happy, and make him not scream. So he slowly stops. The boiling water stops pouring from his eyes, and the shot put stops rolling before it can crush his skull and make him die.

His pupils are dilating, and the End is gently touching his shoulders. It's warm. His alphabet soup spells out calm, and the noose lets him go so he can breathe again.

"Ouma-kun," the End says softly, "are... you okay?"

What's okay? He's okay. He's always okay! So he says so, but all that happens is spit. Spit that comes up his throats like blood, like a boy who got sick in the middle of game about life and death. That thought is funny. But it's not, because Ouma likes that boy. In his dreams, that boy treats him kindly as he lays down on a metal bed.

The End pulls a sleeve over his hand and wipes his mouth with it, which is gross, but he likes the feeling of not having blood on his face. He sniffles.

"Sorry," the End mumbles. Sorry is a stupid word. Sorry is a liars word, but that's okay, because the End is nice and doesn't like lying. He thinks. And there he goes, thinking again! He doesn't need to think to know the End lies, even though he hates Ouma for being a liar. He told him so, he said he'd die alone, but the End lies too so he's a hypocrite.

Ouma hates hypocrites.

But hate is a strong word, and you can't love someone you hate, so maybe he's just lying again. Besides, the End bandaged his finger when he had cut himself up so he cant be a bad person! Bad people don't bandage cuts and cry over hanging girls with pretty blonde hair, so the End isn't a bad person.

That's true. He says so. He says so to him out loud, voice full of spit-blood, and the End looks surprised. "You," he says, eyes looking shocked, "you can remember me?"

Ouma thinks he does, because the end also has a last name. Saihara-chan, that's the last name, and its a very good name. But talking again sounds hard, so he nods. Nodding is easy.

Saihara-chan seems surprised again, but he just squeezes his lips tight and holds hard onto Ouma's shoulder. The little space between his eyebrows is scrunched up. "I'll call Kirigiri-san," he stands back up, hand pulling away from his shoulder and leaving him empty again. "Stay here, okay?" And then he runs away.

Stay. Stay, stay, stay. He can do that! Because his legs won't work and his walker is still mad at him, he can do what Saihara-chan asked him to. He's never done that before! He's never listened to him before! So Ouma stays, and then Saihara-chan comes back with Kirigiri-san running behind him.

She takes him under the shoulders and helps him up, Saihara-chan bringing his walker back to him. It still looks like it'll leave him, but it decides that it can help him back to his room. But that's it! Nothing more. He pats the walker's handle and smiles at it as an apology. If you don't apologize to people, they'll be mad forever. Then they'll abandon you to find someone who says sorry, so you've got to be nice.

Kirigiri-san waves off Saihara-chan, and Ouma waves too. Blood still rolls down his arms, like blood rolls down wooden poles and sprays against metal bugs. He missed his friend, he thinks. He also thinks they weren't friends, but something inside of his ribs feels hot and floaty when he sees him, so they must've been.

Anyways, he's led into his room again and put back to bed. His toes are warm in his socks, and his pillow is soft against his neck. That's good, because the softness will get rid of the bruises, so that he doesn't have to see them when he wakes up. When he wakes up, he won't have to see his dreams either, so he closes his eyes while Kirigiri-san talks and goes to sleep. She's probably mad at him anyhow, so taking a nap doesn't matter too much.

Tonight, though, he doesn't dream at all. When he wakes up, soup remade, all he can do is smile. Because today he's going to do something, and he hasn't gone out in a while. So when Kirigiri-san brings in a boy with golden eyes and introduces him as Saihara-kun, Ouma sticks out a hand and tells him his own name.

The boy looks surprised, and maybe a little sad, but shakes his hand back nonetheless. "Nice to meet you," he says, "I hope we can be friends."

Ouma hopes so too, for some reason. And deep in his heart, he knows that that isn't a lie.

**Author's Note:**

> this was something i had a lot of fun with :) i enjoy writing things that are really jumbled up because i can typically go ham on the self projection. here are some extra Infos:
> 
> \- celestia is a therapist  
> \- kirigiri does her best as ouma's caretaker, but it takes a village  
> \- like i said in the tags, chiaki and chihiro are his siblings  
> \- he remembers each patient and person differently. the previous victims (dr1 & sdr2) are mostly called by name, while he associates his classmates with other things. harukawa with red, shinguuji with the "boiling water" that made up his tears at 1 point, iruma by name as well. sometimes he cant remember the names, sometimes he can (like with saihara)  
> \- o rite the abt the end thing. some websites said shuuichi means "one lord/heir" and the wiki said it meant "end/last one". so i just decided to die bc i cant read kanji  
> \- thank u for reading :))


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